Earlier this year, African carrier's carrier WIOCC asked a panel of experts - among them DT Editor James Barton - how they would invest $100 million in African ICT. This week, in the run-up to AfricaCom, Developing Telecoms will republish their opinions.
Our Editor's view was that extending and installing newmobile networks to deliver 4G/LTE would deliver the best ROI:
The ICT challenge in Africa today is extending affordable connectivity within the continent. This will be achieved through a combination of technologies and services, but principally high-capacity mobile broadband networks using microwave radio access and fibre optic backbones. Delivering a combination of data services, internet access and voice over mobile networks is essential to achieving affordability. This increases the range of services CSPs can offer to customers and lowers the breakeven point and therefore the cost to consumers of each service.
As more people can afford to access an increased range of services, costs will be shared and driven down through competition. The emergence in Africa of mobile banking as a mass market service demonstrates how providing affordable access to data services enables economically sustainable new business models to grow. Internet penetration in Africa is amongst the lowest in the world.
This provides a huge opportunity for the communications industry. Most people in Africa will have their first experience of the internet over a mobile device and as a result will probably never use a PC. This will inevitably shape the type of services which become successful there and the way services develop and grow in future.
The high cost of bandwidth is currently one of the biggest barriers to development in Africa, even in more developed countries such as South Africa. This reflects the legacy of 2G and 3G mobile networks which cover large parts of Africa today.
These have done and continue to provide a great service for Africa - potentially the most economically transformative development the continent has ever experienced. However, so much more can still be done.I would therefore use US$100m to upgrade, extend and install new mobile networks to deliver 4G/LTE services. I would do this first in the most economically developed areas - big cities and the more densely populated areas. Any investment must make a return, and these areas offer the greatest potential for this.
Sustainability is also vital to any investment in infrastructure. The economic growth and development taking place in Africa now will not only ensure that new 4G communications services will prosper, but will also provide the capital needed in the future to extend these networks to less densely populated areas.
Sadly, US$100m is nothing like enough to upgrade and extend mobile networks to deliver affordable mobile broadband throughout the continent. But it’s a testament to the sustainability of the economic development delivered in Africa by existing mobile networks that over time this will happen.
